Trot entryist logic and the Labour Party

This made so little sense to me, I felt obliged to share

Workers' Liberty on 'Why Labour Lost'

http://www.workersliberty.org/node/25122

An imaginary conversation with a Blairite after 7 May.

Blairite: Labour has gone too far left and must move back to the centre ground.

Solidarity: Like the Lib Dems? The Lib Dems were the one party which carefully positioned itself as the golden mean, the happy medium, the equipoise. They got thrashed. Tories, Ukip, SNP, Greens — all those parties did well by coming out with something a bit left-field (or right-field).

B: So you think Labour just has to be more and more radical, and it will automatically win?

S: I didn’t say that. I do say that Labour’s half-and-half combination of vague generalities against “predators” and for “working people” with only microscopic, geeky adjustments in actual policy (cuts, NHS, tax, zero-hours, minimum wage, banks) made it seem, weirdly, both conservative and flaky. A clear and confident stand for improved social provision and worker rights, with higher taxes on the rich and more controls on the banks, would have won more votes.

B: Tony Blair knew how. He won three elections by presenting Labour as centre ground.

S: People wearied and sceptical of changes introduced by one party can be swayed to another party which promises “normalcy” (US Republicans, 1920) or a “relaxed and comfortable” future (Australian Liberals, 1988) or “stable government… not inflamed by the passions of class warfare” (Tories, 1951). In 1997, with people fed up after 18 years of Tory restructuring, Blair could win support with a spiel about a “third way” between left and right. But only shallow, thin-rooted support. The centre ground must usually belong to conservatives. And when people think the economy is in crisis — as now — they will distrust a party which promises above all to be careful and to make only marginal changes.

And from another slightly less unsuccessful but non-entryist Trot group

http://socialistworker.co.uk/art/40491/Labours+betrayals+let+Tories+back+in